Page 12 of Like a Hurricane

I’d had to make a quick call to her security company and pull a favor with the owner since she’d clocked her security system being disabled last night. Granted, I hadn’t expected her to check and that was on me.

If I hadn’t been watching the monitors at the time and seen the call, I would never have been able to tap the line and hear it. The owner pulled the strings I needed and settled her but if I was to do that again, I’d have to use a more tactile way of gaining entry to her house.

Though the next time I’m inside those walls, I was aiming to be invited.

Rolling my shoulders, I hit play on the playlist she was listening to in her car and settle back in the chair.

Such a damn easy mission. These circles were all the same, money and business talk, pomp and show. The targets were as average as they come, a father and son duo coming in hot and heavy on Victor’s territory or so he thinks. They were just businessmen, smart businessmen with a lot of money and sway in the industry.

Did I think it was worth killing them over? No. Was I still going to do it? Of course, I was. I didn’t much care whether the men I was killing had done anything to deserve it. That wasn’t my job to do. I took contracts, fired the gun, and took the money at the end of it. Perhaps this one would land me on a beach in Bora Bora. Perhaps I’d even take Arryn with me.

My targets had no special routines, work, bar and gym, day in, day out. They sat in their stuffy offices, in their pressed suits talking numbers over and over. I’d looked into both the father and son, neither had anything worth mentioning which had surprised me some.

Most of these people havesomethingto hide but these guys were squeaky clean.

I link my fingers behind my head and glance at the clock. Seven hours to go.

I stand in front of the restaurant, hands in my pockets as the car pulls up out front. The driver climbs out, stoic and professional as he walks around and opens the back door. I take a few strides to the door and offer a hand to help her out of the back of the car.

Her manicured fingers slide over my palm in a gentle caress before they curl around it, and she pulls herself out of the car. The touch of her is like electricity, like the static in the air right before lightning strikes and then my eyes land on her.

She’s in a floor length champagne colored dress, the neckline low and the material clinging to her shape, from her trim waist, over the curve of her hips and then down her long legs. Black hair pulled over one shoulder and lips painted a blood red, she has more than just my head turning.

“Arryn,” I address her by her first name, watching her lashes flutter as I rasp her name, “You look beautiful.”

“Thank you.”

I link her arm with mine as I walk in through the doors to the restaurant, smirking at the eyes that follow us through. Her fingers flex where they rest on my forearm.

“You came, after all,” I say as I pull out her chair, letting my fingers skim her back as she takes her seat.

“Call it an apology for how I acted before,” She dips her chin while I take my seat across from her, calling for the server to pour the wine.

She thanks them and plucks up her glass.

“No apology needed,” I tell her, taking in every line of her face, from the slope of her nose to the plump lips and sharp jaw.

“So will you tell me what business you have with my father?”

“Not tonight.”

“Well how can you be sure there will be another opportunity?” She swirls her wine in her glass, looking at me from beneath her lashes.

I chuckle. The woman is tough as fucking nails. Another thing I hadn’t been expecting. I hadn’t guessed it when I met her in her father’s office, but I soon realized it after watching her over the last few days. She handled herself with grace while her words were as sharp as the knives I had stashed back at the apartment.

I could see now how Torin became so damn obsessed with Maya without even really knowing her. It was like a magnet you can’t ignore.

“Because Miss Lauder, I intend on making you so damn obsessed with me, you won’t want to leave my side.”

“It’ll be a cold day in hell when I become obsessed with any man, Everett, sorry to disappoint.”

“Bad history?”

“Not particularly,” She picks up the menu, “I’ve just found men in general to be entirely lacking and rather disappointing.”

“Well, they weren’t me,” I tell her confidently, “I can assure you, there are very few things I lack.”

“An ego isn’t one of them, I see,” She licks across her teeth and quirks a brow but the little pull on her mouth betrays her real feelings on the matter.

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